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So this is how the story goes. In 1826 a London merchant decides to buy some cloth from a weaver in Hawick, a town in the Scottish borders famous for its cloth production. Very happy with his order, he decides to get some more but – crucially – misreads the weaver’s dashed handwriting. Instead of ‘twill’ this Londoner reads ‘tweed’, and assumes this new cloth must take after the River Tweed which runs fast and clear through the textile areas of lower Scotland. ‘Tweed’ and not ’twill’ has been the term used ever since.

New to London? Here for business or perhaps a little shopping? Looking for a specific building? These days we might use the internet or our smartphones to find the right places and navigate around the city, technology of which the Victorian visitor to London could only dream.

Hot off the Press….this month sees the publication of two brand new MOLA monographs invovling the work of the osteology team. Excavations at New Bunhill Fields, Southwark in 2008 uncovered evidence of a heavily used private burial ground. Documentary sources suggest that from c 1821–53 up to 33,000 burials may have taken place in the commercial Nonconformist burial ground. Excavation of 827 wooden coffin burials allowed comparisons of the use of the burial ground, coffin furniture and burial finds with other contemporary cemeteries. Of particular interest were the good level of preservation of floral remains in a child’s coffin, ceramic […]